With last night’s introduction of the new Galaxy Note 3 and Galaxy Note 10.1 2014 edition, both devices got spec bumps, better displays, and a new leather-like textured back– but Samsung isn’t introducing any radical design changes. It’s not exactly surprising– it did the same with the Galaxy S4– and the upgraded specs will only help the company continue the success it’s had with the stylus focused devices. However, the real stand out features of the new Notes come in the way of S Pen features accessible through the new “Air Command” function. The feature pops up a radial menu from just about anywhere when hovering the S Pen and clicking its button, and the menu will let you access a few handy (gimmicky?) new features for multitasking and quickly saving content. Samsung is focusing on the new S Pen features in its ads for Note 3 and new Note 10.1, and we decided to go hands on in the video above to get some first impressions. We quite enjoyed using the new S Window feature to open apps in a sizeable window within another, but some shortcomings with the new multitasking features might make them more gimmicky than a faster alternative to other solutions with third-party apps. You can also quickly access Quick Action memos and Screen Write for annotating screenshots, nice additions to the radial menu but nothing that we couldn’t do with the S Pen previously.

Best iPhone, iPad, & Apple TV game controllers

Guides

About the Author

Jordan writes about all things Apple as Senior Editor of 9to5Mac, & contributes to 9to5Google, 9to5Toys, & Electrek.co. He also co-authors 9to5Mac’s weekly Logic Pros series and makes music as one half of Toronto-based Makamachine.